Dustin Friedland and his wife Jamie had just finished Christmas shopping at the Mall at Short Hills last Sunday when four men held them up at gunpoint as they loaded packages into their car.

There was a struggle and one of the men shot Dustin in the head before escaping in the Friedland's Range Rover. Authorities say Dustin may have been trying to protect his wife, who was already inside the car. She was pulled out at gunpoint, but was not harmed.

Prosecutors say the four men had been casing out the mall's parking lot — which cut back on security in the last few years — looking for an expensive car to steal.

“We used to be contacted by that mall to provide additional people for their parking lot on the outside of the mall, and we haven’t heard from them in a while," Essex County Sheriff Armando Fontoura told NJ.com. “I think that those malls have a responsibility to make sure those folks on the outside are secure.”